Kula: Foreign workers not ‘stealing’ jobs from locals

The human resources minister says foreign workers are hired for jobs that do not require vocational certification.

DEWAN RAKYAT

Human Resources Minister M Kulasegaran says priority is given to locals. (Youtube screengrab)

KUALA LUMPUR: Human Resources Minister M Kulasegaran has given the assurance that allowing foreign workers to work in Malaysia will not affect job opportunities for locals.

He said foreign workers were hired for jobs that do not require vocational certification, therefore they would not be taking jobs meant for locals who were equipped with vocational certification.

Among others, these jobs include construction workers, cleaners and farmers.

Citing a survey done by JobsMalaysia 2.0, Kulasegaran said it found that there were more vacancies for these jobs than applicants, hence taking in foreign workers would not affect job opportunities for locals who have vocational qualifications.

“I must make it clear that foreign workers are not brought in to replace locals who are vocational graduates.

“Based on previous records, foreign workers have been filling up jobs that the locals were not interested in taking up.

“But that being said, we must remember that locals must be given priority and the dependency on foreign workers must be reduced,” he said.

Kulasegaran was responding to a question from Danyal Balagopal Abdullah (PH-Port Dickson) in the Dewan Rakyat on the government’s plans to encourage employers to hire locals rather than foreigners, for example, by overcoming problems in terms of wages and the rights of the workers.

Kulasegaran added that the minimum wage RM1,500 was a suggestion by PH to reduce the dependency on foreign workers but it was a long-term goal that would be achieved in five years.

He said, the current focus by the government was to ensure equal wages in Sabah and Sarawak, and that this was one of the 100-day promises in the coalition’s manifesto.

Meanwhile, addressing a supplementary question on the intake of foreign cooks, Kulasegaran said the policy to restrict foreign cooks had yet to be finalised.

“I did make the suggestion, but we had a lot of objections from local restaurant operators saying that the policy shift was not allowing them enough time to overcome the lack of cooks.

“What we want is a win-win policy and so there is no blanket policy made on this. The restaurants were previously allowed to bring in foreign guest workers, that policy stays,” he said.

He said the over dependence on foreign workers have to stop to prevent cases like the alleged scam involving Bestinet Sdn Bhd.

According to the Nepali Times report, the scam involved fees for visas and biometric screening by Nepali companies affiliated with Bestinet, which developed a foreign worker system for the Immigration Department.

Media reports also linked Bestinet to former home minister Ahmad Zahid Hamidi and several Umno politicians, and with Bangladesh middlemen who made huge profits from Bangladeshi migrant workers.

Both Bestinet and Zahid have denied the allegations.

Last year, there were 1.8 million foreign workers, with 250,000 working in the service sector, including in restaurants.

In March, Immigration Department director-general Mustafar Ali said immigration rules stipulated that foreigners could only work as cooks. Restaurants and coffee shops were not allowed to hire foreigners as front-liners, he said.

Following that, two food and beverage associations representing over 21,000 members called on Putrajaya to relax the immigration regulations as it was difficult to get locals to do the job.

On June 22, Kulasegaran reportedly said all restaurants serving Malaysian food could only hire locals as cooks starting Jan 1 next year.

He had later clarified that the local cooks requirement was only applicable to “ordinary local food” outlets and not to foreign cuisine restaurants, high-end restaurants and five-star hotels, which required specialised chefs. - FMT